'My name is Lucas Soul. Today, I died again. This is my fifteenth death in the last four hundred and fifty years.' Soul is an outcast of the Immortal Societies. Born of a Bastian mother and a Crovir father, a half-breed who is abhorred by the two races, he spends the first three hundred and fifty years of his existence being chased and killed by the Hunters. One fall night in Boston, the Hunt starts again, resulting in Soul's fifteenth death and triggering a chain of events that sends him on the run with Reid Hasley, a former US Marine and his human business partner. From Paris to Prague, their search for answers leads them deep into the Immortal societies and brings them face to face with someone from Soul's past. Shocking secrets are revealed and fresh allies come to the fore as they uncover a new and terrifying threat to both immortals and humans. To defeat his enemies, Soul must embrace his tortured fate and become the Hunter. But time is running out. Can he protect the ones he loves and prevent another Immortal War before his seventeenth and final death?
Reviews with the most likes.
Hunted is a fast paced, adrenaline filled story. Car chases and sword fights (who doesn't love a good sword fight?) and shoot outs and supernatural beings and all kinds of nifty edge of your seat stuff. Like sitting in a dark movie theater, edge of your seat stuff. Normally I hesitate to say a book should be made into a movie. There are always things that get left out or changed (or destroyed). Most of the time...to repeat the cliche...the book is better. BUT...in this instance, I'd probably cheer for a movie. Why? Because sometimes movies make corrections that need to be made. Corrections the author should have seen and corrected on his or her own but for whatever reason didn't. There are definitely a couple of those glaring details that need that smoothing over thing movies do in order to get the general public to accept them.
Our lead character, Lucas Soul is pretty close to being a top of the line Gary Stu. In Mary Poppins' standards, he'd practically perfect. Brilliant sword fighter? Check. Owns and knows how to use every type of gun, bullet, weapon? Check. Halo Jumping experience? Check. Willing to sacrifice himself by injecting a dangerous virus into his veins? Check. Has a day job where he looks for lost kittens? Check. Can apparently never, ever, ever die? Double Check. See? I think the only blemish on his record is his choice in love interest, but we'll get to that in a moment. I was never concerned for his life (and not just because this is the 1st book in a series). I never wondered how he was going to get out of whatever ridiculous situation he was in. Because he was soooooo good at everything he did. The only thing I was concerned about was not injuring myself while rolling my eyes.
The villains, particularly Felix Thorne were pretty basic, mustache twirling, cardboard cutout antagonists. There wasn't enough detail there to pretend they were more than that.
So about that love interest thing. This is the icky thing I'd really need the movie version to change. Anna, his love interest is also his cousin. Like first cousin - her mother and Lucas's mother were sisters. Both of them spend half the story mutually trying to keep their grandfather alive. Yeah, they're both immortals and we're told multiple times in story that immortals have had procreation problems since the whole plague thing. But cousins? BLECH. A simple “she was adopted/raised by an honorary grandfather after her family was killed” explanation could have easily fixed this icky-ness. On top of that, it was one of those insta-love plot points that never sits well with me.
I did like Reid and his dry humor. And the fact that he was still loyal to Lucas even after coming thisclose to dying a half dozen times. The chases - both on foot and by car and even helicopter were fun, if not exhausting. Could have used a little more breathing room between action sequences but that's more a personal preference than something that harmed the story. The author obviously did her research - which there is a lot to do when your main characters are hundreds of years old - so that is a definite plus.
Over all, a fun, no holds barred, urban fantasy/supernatural read as long as you don't think too much about it or pay too much attention to the details.
